NEW ORLEANS, La. (KLFY) – NCIS: New Orleans is about a small team of NCIS agents working in the Crescent City. NCIS stands for Naval Criminal Investigative Service and there really is an NCIS office in New Orleans. There’s also a real guy behind Scott Bakula’s character, Agent Dwayne Pride. He is retired NCIS Agent D’Wayne Swear.
“It’s invaluable having D’Wayne here. D’Wyane Swear who’s the character, he’s the real guy that my character is based upon,” Bakula said.
Swear added, “It’s great to be honored to have someone like Scott Bakula mimic you to some degree.”
Swear is a New Orleans native and worked at NCIS offices in New Orleans and the Philippines. He said the New Orleans office was small, just like the one on the show. Swear serves as the show’s technical advisor.
I asked him, “So if you see something that’s totally out of whack, you’re going to say hey guys, this isn’t…”
“I do,” Swear answered. “I do and I explain why, validate it for them but try to make it work and say why don’t we do it this way and it works out that way. There’s not been one time we have not been able to work it out.”
Realism is important, but Swear also realizes it’s a TV show meant to entertain. Gunfire, fights, and car chases are common on the show.
“So did you have that kind of action in your career?” I asked Swear.
“Uh, from my neighborhood? No. Uh uh. No we didn’t have that much action. There were some close calls,” Swear replied.
I was in New Orleans when they filmed the May 5 episode. I asked Bakula and Zoe McLellan, who plays Agent Meredith Brody, what it’s like to have D’Wyane Swear involved with the show.
“I ask him questions every day about different things that we’re doing here on a technical level,” Bakula said. “Also we get stories from him. He gives us input on what would make sense or not make sense in terms of tactics and those kinds of things.”
McLellan said, “He’s a great teacher. He’s a really great teacher. He’s a great mentor and we all love him and he looks out for us as well. Pretty cool.”
The sense of realism is also evident on each of the sets. CCH Pounder, who plays medical examiner Dr. Loretta Wade, can attest to the realistic and sometimes gruesome-looking props.
“The only thing that’s not there is if you opened up one of the drawers, you won’t find a dead body but they could put one in there pretty fast,” Pounder joked.
The first thing you notice when you walk into the lab and morgue sets is all of the equipment is authentic. Pounder said the set designers have a great attention to detail.
“So everything’s there that you could possibly want and, in fact, when people who come from the coroner’s office come to visit, a lot of time the machinery that is here they often wish that they had it in the real deal,” Pounder said.
The show’s formula – a gumbo of realism, military themes, the sights of New Orleans, and likeable characters – has made NCIS: New Orleans a fan favorite that will return in the fall for a second season.
The show also has guest stars. One of them this season was Dean Stockwell, who starred with Bakula in the TV show Quantum Leap. Bakula told me it was fantastic to reunite with him. He said Stockwell was only in town for a day so they didn’t have much time to catch up. He said they had a wonderful experience on Quantum Leap and share a bond that will be with them for the rest of their lives.
